Considering today was meant to be a relaxing one, I ended up being rather busy and venturing out for most of it .

After a huge mix up with doctors appointments , I had to return to see the midwife today (you can keep up with my pregnancy posts on the pregnancy blog regarding that).

Being in the new home not that long , the village is still very new to us and so we don't know what is around us fully , well except for the local shop , school and obviously the doctors which for the first time today I took the kids for a long walk to this morning with me.

After spending a short time we eventually wrapped up the toys they had been playing with in the waiting room then decided to pop in to our local park which was luckily right behind the surgery and on our way back home.

I was merely surprised at how good the park was . For my children aged 5 years to 13 years , it was suitable and they spent a good hour or so running around , taking turns on everything .

The two smaller boys loved going crazy on the huge tire swing , I was surprised how brave they were being, maybe I am just starting to realise they are a lot more tougher than I think sometimes.

Drew sat her bum in the little yellow dome which slanted to one side and span around making herself all dizzy for me to catch when she stepped out. Unbeknown to her the thing was filled with rain water and so when she got out she was a little wet but nothing to stop her from carrying on.

As well as the usual play frames and slides and swings we also noticed over the field was a basketball court where some other children played and also something else but not being able to see so clearly we decided to walk over and take a closer look to discover it was in fact an outdoor gym .

Now there was a huge sign on the perimeter explaining that the gym was suitable for 15 years and above , but seeing the children on some of the apparatus and knowing that it would be ok with my supervision Ii let them enjoy some of the items.

It was a rather enjoyable novelty , being that their dad had only just gone and bought himself a few of the same things for his own use at home such as the rowing machine and cross trainer and of the course the gym itself .

Philip , the oldest took straight to the rowing machine while drew jumped on the cross trainer even with the winds starting to pick up .

Typically the other two girls just hung about waiting on them .

It started to get really windy, the rain was starting to slowly descend and so we took a long brisk walk back home and had something warm in our bellies for dinner before popping back out.

There is one great thing about where we live , we literally have the community centre attached to us , so when the children want to pop over for the activities they can do but at the moment there are only a few days which are available for them to go and because it was the holidays, today was open between 1- 2:30 for what they describe as Ground works.

Basically someone from our of the Community centre, comes into it and entertains the children from the village and up until recently this was only £1 but is now free of charge .

There were a few activities on and after running around in the garden and playing chasey and hide the beanbag games with the team leaders, Kaiden fell over in the biggest , dirtiest , muddiest puddle. I had to get Philip to run home to grab new clothes for him to change into so we could carry on with the indoor activities as his whole back was covered in wet muddy mess.

The girls carried on playing hide the beanbag (being made aware that they stayed of the mud or would come inside) and I took the two smaller boys indoors to build some lego .We made two fabulous boats , each very different and built two men up to ride them while Sian the older girl made Easter baskets and Hama bead designs.

It was not long before the centre was closing so we came home to finally relax.

The kids have had a fabulous busy day and although we don't have much in the village, we did try to make the most out of it today .

So today was busy for the little ones and now Ii have the joy of making a lovely Pasta bake for tea (whilst keeping some aside for the husband as he is working all day and wont be back until late tonight), we are then going to get our P,J's on and watch t.v , play computer games and me? well I will be working as usual, no rest for the busy mum of 7 with one on the way .

Oh, it's really good you went outside and enjoyed your day even when the weather was so windy! Also it's really nice you have outside playground and the gym. You can't see it very often nowadays. Hope you get to know your new village soon!

I have been living in the same part of London for 10 years and still find new things on my doorstep! Sounds like you had a great day exploring. Outdoor gyms are fantastic, we have a few in the parks near us and are always in use. Stephen :o)